


An Honest Man

by qwanderer



Series: Pardicer [14]
Category: Leverage
Genre: Episode: s05e15 The Long Goodbye Job, F/M, Grief, Multi, POV Nate, owwie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-02
Updated: 2017-02-02
Packaged: 2018-09-21 14:08:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9552257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer
Summary: "This crew followed you because, the day you met them, you were an honest man. You were there for one reason, and one reason only. Nate, you were there because of Sam."





	

**Author's Note:**

> hiiii yeah I did this it is sad
> 
> stole dialog from TLGJ of course
> 
> I intend to do more in this series but not sure what or when

"The black book? That's what you dragged us here for?" Eliot growled. 

"That's why we're in Portland?" Sophie said indignantly. "You lied to us!" 

"You lied to me?" Parker asked Hardison, more quietly. 

"I'm sorry." 

"Don't - don't put this on him," Nate told Parker. "He kept my secret. We keep each other's secrets sometimes," he reminded her. 

She kept secrets. Only a few people had known where her first warehouse was. And secrets from members of the team weren't just a thing of her past. 

Of any of their pasts, really. 

He knew that they'd been playing with him, the team. The younger three. Little games of cat and mouse, throwing out red herrings for him to chase to find out what was going on, if he wanted to learn about their personal lives. They'd fight, they'd hug, they'd joke-or-not-joke, especially Parker. She was clearly masterminding some kind of smokescreen. 

They didn't mean it maliciously. It was a game, he knew that. A game he'd been enjoying. But it was... odd. 

With Parker, he suspected it was partly for practice. Practice at grifting, at being slippery, at leaving a calculated impression, right or wrong. But he also knew that she wouldn't con her own team, not without a reason. A good reason. So probably one of the others had instigated it. 

Now, Hardison. Hardison hated that he'd had to keep the Black Book job from the team for so long. And he was not shy about letting Nate know about that. So if he were the instigator, the motivation could be... fair play. An outlet for his frustration, and something he _could_ share with the team. Excluding Nate. Hardison was one to enjoy small, harmless acts of vengeance. The kind that could easily end up funny, for all involved, if the target had a sense of humor. 

That had been the working theory, until Christmas. 

On Christmas, Sophie gave her little speech on trust, and Parker had latched onto it. Invited Eliot to share. Like she expected something in particular. 

Eliot was the keystone. The go-or-no-go. It was his secret they were keeping, and they looked to him for cues. 

Now, he'd known Eliot had been getting closer to them, since the dam job, since the brew pub. 

Eliot had a push-and-pull about him, had since that first job. Since he'd tried to talk to Nate about what had happened with Sam. He might have worked alone, before, might have pushed people away, likely for their own good. Nate knew that trick all too well himself, he could certainly recognize it in the kind of muscle he'd spent his entire life around. But the difference with Eliot was that, as much as he fought and growled and scowled and glared, it wasn't hard to find the evidence that he genuinely liked people, that he cared what happened to the team, that he wanted connection, wanted... intimacy. 

Nate had pushed back against that first overture, hard. "We're not friends," he'd said. But that wasn't because Eliot wouldn't make a good one. It was because Nate... Nate hadn't been ready. 

He and Eliot were good friends, now. But Nate knew that he wasn't the easiest person. He knew that, in many ways, Hardison was. He knew that Parker had emotional calluses in a lot of the same places as Eliot. They were both angry at the world, and inured to some of its worst misfortunes. 

So it hadn't been surprising when the three of them had gotten close. 

When Nate had told Hardison to set up a headquarters in Portland, he'd expected there to be a large purchase involved, probably offices, maybe a bar. There'd been advantages to living over McRory's. 

The microbrewery and pub, that had been... a bit over-the-top, even for Hardison. But it was a good building, living space for all of them, in case they wanted it, a good back room for planning. Enough going on to keep the team from looking conspicuous. Especially since the younger three were all actively involved in running the pub. 

He knew that Eliot and Parker each had their own places - Parker, probably another warehouse, and Eliot... well... he'd put money on Eliot owning one of those odd little suburban plots with corn and squash growing in the backyard. Not actually all that uncommon, in Portland. But they both stayed in the pub often. Parker, he assumed, because of Hardison, and Eliot, because he hated when the pub wasn't being properly taken care of. 

But then, he had _assumed_. 

If the three of them had a secret together... something personal... maybe there was more there than he'd suspected. 

Come to think of it, Nate had never really paid much attention to which of them slept where, when they were here. 

Huh. 

Well, that could go on the back burner. They all had other things to think about right now, anyway. 

* * *

"Okay, to pull this off, we're going to need James Sterling, and to get him involved, to get him to bite, we're going to need a fleet of red herrings. I'm thinking... we should fake all your deaths." 

"Cool," Parker said, and Nate could see her gears turning. 

"We gonna need ballistics gel dummies?" Hardison asked. "I can do those. I can make 'em real pretty." 

Eliot looked at him skeptically. "How do I die?" he asked. 

Nate looked right back at him. "I've been giving it some thought." 

The whole crew turned to focus on him, then. 

"I had this picture in my head, since before Portland, since the dam, since Dubenich, of the three of you huddling in the back of the van. A job gone wrong, or one that so easily could have. Trying to get away, me and Soph, with you bleeding out in the back." 

"You think about that a lot?" Hardison asked. 

"Plan 'M'," Nate reminded him. 

Parker nodded. "He thinks about a lot of things a lot." 

"You die together," he tells them. "As a team." 

Eliot gave him a long look. Then he nodded. 

Nate nodded back, then clapped his hands. "Okay! What are we gonna need to pull this off, and what do we need to do to get it?" 

* * *

Sophie really was... very good at directing. He loved watching her work. 

Come to think of it, putting on a play, or making a movie, could get very much like planning a heist. So many elements had to come together, exactly right, at exactly the right time. To con the audience. To suspend disbelief. 

Nate wondered if he might enjoy a role like assistant director, maybe stage manager. Once in a while. 

"Have you got a minute?" he asked her, as her cast dispersed. 

She laughed. "For you," she told him, "I've got the whole night." 

She was in a good mood. He didn't want to break the spell, talk about the job. But it needed talking about, eventually. 

They were in the brew pub, still, at closing, and he hadn't brought it up. 

"You're avoiding something," she noted. "Care to tell me what?" 

"You know this job is going to be rough," he said. "They're going to bring me into the tower, and I won't have any of you in my ear. I'll have to know my part, and I'll have to be convincing. Not just as a character. As myself. To Interpol agents. To Sterling." 

"Ah," said Sophie. "That's what this is about." 

"He knows me. It needs to be real. So tell me what I need to do to make this real. I know you've helped the others. The, ah, the job with the alien transmissions, when you coached Eliot. He's never done something so different. Most of his grifts, they, uh, they follow a formula. Not that one." 

"And so do yours. Yes. Well, there's a trick to it, and you're not gonna like it." 

"I'm not, huh?" Nate asked. 

"The excitement he channeled that day, the passion, it was real. The rhythm, it was borrowed. Switching contexts, keeping energy consistent, you know that part, we both do. You grift all the time, and you do it marvelously. But, Nate, the roles you play, the characters you create for yourself? They're not honest men." 

"And why do you think that is?" he asked. 

"Because you're not willing to give that part of yourself to the mark, to the strangers on the street. But it's there. This crew followed you because, the day you met them, you were an honest man. You were there for one reason, and one reason only. Nate, you were there because of Sam." 

There was a long, angry silence. He saw the shape of what she was saying, and no, he didn't like it. 

"You need this agent to believe that you are distraught. That you are grieving. That these... these _children_ , who you love, who are your family, who you have done your best to keep safe and happy, that they are dead. And that you... bear the guilt of that." 

"You're telling me I have to use my son." 

"You asked me," Sophie reminded him. "You asked me how to make it real. To make it different. Authentic. There is no grifter's trick, no breathing exercise, that can do that for you." She sighed, got up, laid a hand on his arm. "Nate, I know you can play this part cold, and you can do it believably. So if you want to forget you ever asked, if you want to drop this, then drop it. But if you want to go the extra mile, then you need to ask yourself how much of who you are you're willing to give to this job." 

Nate looked at her for a moment, then nodded in resignation. "I'll think about it," he told her. 

She went upstairs, and he sat, in the dark of the closed bar, and thought about it. 

* * *

"What was your mistake?" 

There were so many. 

He'd been blindered, so set on what was in front of him, so set on the job, that he didn't stop to consider the impact it might have on... 

Sam. 

His kids. His ridiculous thieves. His game-playing little scoundrels. 

"You loved them very much, didn't you?" 

And it was working. 

It had damn well _better_ be working. It was like walking through hell. 

She still knew he was lying, about something. 

Even though, in so many ways, he wasn't. He was in that moment, didn't have to think about how this "character" would react. 

"WHY WOULD I LIE? Why? I screwed up, I got them killed! I lost everything, the only thing I ever had! Why, why, why would I lie?" 

He hated this place. 

Just... a little longer. Until the _bodies_ were delivered. 

No. He could let some of it go, now. He had her on the hook. But she needed to think she'd figured him out, for this next bit. 

But he was still shaking, his voice hoarse. Nice touch, really. 

They weren't home safe yet. 

* * *

Sterling had gotten the shape of things, now. Everyone was safe. Everyone except him. It all depended on Sterling, now. 

On the connection between two men with completely different values, two men who only really had one thing in common - their kids. 

"What you were doing, back in the room," Sterling asked, "when did you learn to act like that?" 

"Oh, Sophie. She really helped me. She's directing now. She - she found her calling." 

Sophie knew exactly how to squeeze what she wanted out of anybody. Sophie saw the potential in them, however deep it was buried. 

_Thing about false hope is, uh, the sting of it fades. Unanswered prayers, eventually those - those go away, too. But the idea that his parents could have done something, anything, to save their kid's life, but didn't?_

That never goes away. 

* * *

It could be left behind, though. It could become more part of the past than part of the present. 

Driving away, with this job done, it felt different. 

He felt... a little cleaner. 

Honesty was a funny thing. He felt like he'd let truths seep out of him today, while he lied, and lied, and lied. 

Well. Lies became truths. Truths became lies. A lot could change, with the right context, with the right switch flipped. 

He knew Sophie's real name, but he also knew that it wasn't her real name anymore. Sophie Devereaux, the lie, the grifter, the con woman, the face that was a thousand faces, had become Sophie Devereaux, the director, the storyteller, the voice who drew truth out of her actors, brought their authentic selves to the surface. 

Sophie was Sophie. 

Yes, he wanted to start something new, with Sophie. 

The others were there, waiting, in the pub, with the drive. 

They were ready to move forward with it, to do what needed to be done. 

"You know, this was your crusade," Eliot said. "Now it's our war." 

Sophie fixed her eyes on him. "Promise me you'll keep them safe." 

"Till my dying day," Eliot said, reverently. 

Passionately. 

Was that... was that what he thought it was? 

Now, Parker had insisted that Nate say the words, the traditional words, because Sophie loved the classic gestures. But Parker, she had no attachment to any particular social convention, and Hardison, well, he'd quoted his Nana's words often enough. _Normal is what works for you._

Was this what worked for them? Was this where Eliot found the acceptance and the intimacy he had pushed for since that very first job? 

"You know, Eliot, I'd say call if you need anything, but you never, never need anything." 

They both knew it was a question. 

"Yeah, I did." He gave a long, open, happy look to Parker and Hardison. "And thanks to you, I don't have to search anymore." 

"Yeah," Nate breathed. _That's what I thought._

They were going to be okay. They were going to take care of each other. 

Nate and Sophie left them to their war. They had a life to get to. 

There was so much planning to be done. 

A fresh start, a blank page, waiting to be filled. 

Well. Not entirely blank. He hadn't scrapped everything, after all. But it was nice to have... choices. 

There was a lot he never wanted to look back at. 

But the team was not one of those things. (As it would have been, if that hellscape that felt so real after he'd seen the fake bodies, after he'd imagined the sequence of events in so much detail, had been real.) 

"Did you know?" Nate asked her quietly. "About Eliot? About those three?" 

"Yes," Sophie admitted. "Not from the beginning, but... since I took Eliot through the grift you mentioned. The way he talked about Hardison... about them both... I could see that he was in love. And he told me, then, because he'd rather I know his secret than have me pity him." 

"But he didn't want me to know?" 

"In the beginning, that was it," she said thoughtfully. "By the end, it was... well, those three know something about you now that I've always known." 

"And what is that?" 

"You're happiest with a puzzle in your hands, one that can be solved." 

Nate smiled. "Maybe," he said. "So what puzzle shall we tackle next?" 


End file.
